The Adventures of Kintarō, the Golden Boy

Author: Yei Theodora Ozaki

Time Period: 1901 CE–1950 CE

Country or Culture: Japan

Genre: Folktale

PLOT SUMMARY

In ancient Kyoto, the soldier Kintoki falls in love with a beautiful woman, and they marry. Kintoki’s enemies at the imperial court cause his downfall, and he dies in despair. His widow flees into the wilderness of the Ashigara Mountains. There, she gives birth to a boy. She names him Kintarō, or “golden boy.”

Kintarō is amazingly strong. At age eight, he cuts down trees as efficiently as the woodcutters, who are the only other human inhabitants of the area. His mother gives him a big ax. Kintarō joins the woodcutters for fun, smashing rocks and stones for play as well. The woodcutters call him Wonder-Child and his mother Yama-uba, or “Old Nurse of the Mountains.”

Lacking any other children for playmates, Kintarō learns the language of the animals of the mountains. He befriends many of them, and four of them become his followers. They are a bear, a deer, a monkey, and a hare.

Kintarō’s games include holding sumo-wrestling matches for his favorite four animals. One day, at one of these matches, the hare wrestles with the monkey, and the deer wrestles with the hare. There are different winners of each match.

Returning from the day’s matches, Kintarō and the four animals reach a swollen stream. Wondering how to cross the raging waters, Kintarō proposes to make a bridge for them. Approaching a tall tree on the riverbank, Kintarō grasps its trunk. Pulling hard, he yanks the tree from the ground and casts it across the stream as bridge.

This feat is observed by an old man, dressed as woodcutter, who follows Kintarō home. There, Kintarō parts from the animals and joins his mother. During their conversation about his day, Kintarō tells his mother that he is the strongest of all five companions. The old woodcutter approaches and asks Kintarō for a wrestling bout with him. Their match is a draw.

The old man praises Kintarō’s strength. He asks his mother why she has not sent him to the capital of Kyōto to train to become a samurai. Yama-uba replies that this may be her dream, but as Kintarō is a wild boy without formal education, it seems impossible. Now, the man reveals his true identity. He is General Sadamitsu, serving Lord Minamoto no Raikō. He is roaming the countryside in disguise, scouting for strong boys to be trained for his lord’s army. He proposes to Kintarō’s mother to take the boy and present him to his master.

Yama-uba agrees to this plan, and Kintarō is full of joy at the prospect of becoming a samurai. While his mother is sad at their separation, she is happy for her son’s good fortune. Kintarō promises to return and take care of her once he has become a samurai. His four animal friends appear and wish him good luck.

In Kyōto, Minamoto no Raikō agrees to take on Kintarō. Once Kintarō is a young man and a samurai, he becomes the leader of his lord’s elite fighter group, the Four Braves. Kintarō’s first feat as their leader is to cut off the head of a cannibal monster that has come to terrorize the people near the capital.

Considered a national hero and enjoying power, honor, prestige, and wealth, Kintarō remembers his promise. He builds a house for his mother in Kyōto. She lives there with Kintarō until her death.

SIGNIFICANCE

The Japanese folk hero Kintarō has been extremely popular in his native Japan since at least the seventeenth century CE. In contemporary Japan, dolls of Kintarō, often riding a red carp, are a key part of a family’s decorations for the national Children’s Day on May 5, if a young boy is part of the family. Most Japanese children can sing the traditional Kintarō song.

Traditionally in Japan, the boy hero has been related to the historic figure of the samurai Sakata no Kintoki (956–1012 CE). He was a retainer of the real Fujiwara-era nobleman Minamoto no Yorimitsu, also called Minamoto no Raikō, who lived from 948 to 1021 CE. Sakata has been identified as one of Minamoto’s four key retainers, the Shiten-nō or Four Guardian Kings. Folktales of Kintarō growing into Sakata no Kintoki flourished after the death of the historical samurai.

Many Japanese versions of the origin and birth of Kintarō contain a strong sense of the supernatural. His mother is either a princess, the fairy Yama-uba (Yama-uba is a yōkai, or supernatural monster, who appears in Japanese folklore as a crone), or a noblewoman in exile who is called Yama-uba by the woodcutters among whom she comes to live. Kintarō gets his name from the red bib with the yellow character for gold that he wears, according to Japanese folk tradition. These illustrations of Kintarō have existed since the seventeenth century. Tales of Kintarō’s exploits focus on his strength, courage, loyalty, and later his filial duty to his mother.

As a beloved folk icon in Japan, Kintarō has become a ubiquitous character in many manga stories, anime movies, and video games. There, the development and treatment of his character vary widely. His strength and good nature are a common element of the many creative versions of Kintarō across contemporary Japanese media versions of this folk hero.

The folktale was first rendered in English by A. B. Mitford in his Tales of Old Japan, published in 1871. There, Kintarō’s personal name is translated as “Little Wonder,” and the focus is on his growing up to become the samurai Sakata Kintoki. In 1908, Yei Theodora Ozaki rendered in English “The Adventures of Kintarō, the Golden Boy,” the version followed here. Ozaki’s text is one of the most authoritative translations, capturing well the spirit of the Japanese folktale. Numerous other children’s books in English tell versions of Kintarō’s story. These often focus on his play with his animal friends and their bouts of sumo wrestling.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Hearn, Lafcadio. Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan. 1894. North Clarendon: Tuttle, 2009. Print.

McCarthy, Ralph F., and Suhoi Yonai. Kintaro, the Nature Boy. Small format ed. New York: Kodansha USA, 2000. Print.

Mitford, A. B. “The History of Sakata Kintoki.” Tales of Old Japan. 1871. Mineola: Dover, 2005. 189–93. Print.

Ozaki, Yei Theodora. “The Adventures of Kintaro, the Golden Boy.” Japanese Fairy Tales. 1908. Rutland: Tuttle, 2007. 65–75. Print.

Sakade, Florence, and Yoshio Hayashi. “Kintaro’s Adventures.” Kintarō’s Adventures and Other Japanese Children’s Favorite Stories. North Clarendon: Tuttle, 2008. 26–42. Print.